Boeing heads roll over tanker deal

The Boeing Company has fired its chief financial officer, Michael Sears, for discussing the hiring of a US Air Force official, Darleen Druyun, while she helped negotiate a proposal to acquire Boeing aerial-refuelling tankers.

Mr Sears and Ms Druyun, until now deputy general manager of Boeing's missile-defence business, were dismissed after a company inquiry found the two also tried to hide their misconduct, Boeing said in a statement.

Boeing's senior vice-president of finance and its corporate controller, James Bell, has been named acting chief financial officer.

The Pentagon in September began a probe into whether Ms Druyun, then the USAF's No. 2 acquisition official, gave Chicago-based Boeing a rival's information related to the tanker lease proposal.

At the time, politicians, including Senator John McCain, said the proposal was too costly and was created to benefit Boeing, as chief executive Philip Condit struggled with a drop in commercial-aircraft sales.

"Condit has to deal with any impropriety pretty forcefully," said Win Murray, an analyst at Harris Associates, which owned 2.4 million Boeing shares as of September. "I'm not sure this type of interaction is entirely atypical for this industry, but again so much attention is being paid to this tanker deal that Condit was forced to draw a line."

President George Bush this week signed into law a defence measure that allows the USAF to lease 20 Boeing 767s as refuelling tankers. The $US27.6 billion ($A38.4 billion) plan is a compromise on a deal to lease 100 tankers that had been proposed by the USAF. The air force will add money to its long-range budget to buy 80 planes after the 20 are leased.

Mr Sears, 56, joined Boeing through its 1997 purchase of McDonnell Douglas Corp and was named chief financial officer in May 2000. He was once considered a candidate to succeed Mr Condit.

There's no indication that Boeing benefited from any of this contact.- John Dern, Boeing spokesman

Mr Sears did not follow company procedures for hiring government officials, Boeing spokesman John Dern said. Mr Sears and Ms Druyun had a meeting in October last year before Ms Druyun disqualified herself from working on Boeing business in November. Ms Druyun left the USAF in November 2002 and joined Boeing in January.

"There's no indication that Boeing benefited from any of this contact," Mr Dern said.

The USAF, in a statement, said it was "very concerned" with the firings. It was "currently examining options in this matter to include asking the Defence Department inspector-general or other appropriate authority to investigate the alleged improprieties", the statement said.

Boeing's action was not "typical but also not that rare - I can think of three or four cases", said Stuart Gilman, president of the Ethics Resource Council, a research group that advises companies. "It sends a strong signal to employees."

It is unclear whether Ms Druyun violated the US Code, the primary criminal statute spelling out post-government employment rules.